


Shipwrecked

by INMH



Category: Rule of Rose
Genre: Angst, Gen, General, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, implied PTSD, past trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-28
Updated: 2014-05-28
Packaged: 2018-01-26 23:14:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1706063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/INMH/pseuds/INMH
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are certain games that Jennifer can’t play.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shipwrecked

“Let’s play airship!”

_(come along, Jennifer)_

Jennifer’s chest tightened, and she swallowed painfully.

 _Let’s not. Let’s not, not again, **please**_ -

But Wendy wasn’t there, and so Diana had the final say: “Fine.”

Most of the game is based in their imaginations, something the children of the orphanage had no shortage of; God knew they needed it, many days. And Jennifer’s imagination was just as strong as theirs, if not stronger due to the fact that she’s actually _been_ on an airship before.

But they don’t know that, and she has no intention of telling them.

_(come along, dear)_

The orphanage itself is transformed into the airship _(it’s so big!)_. Hoffman is holed up in his office and Martha is napping, so the children can play undisturbed. It is rainy outside, foggy, and so Diana leads them to the upper floors so that they can look out the windows and into the “clouds” below.

_(i can’t see the ground)_

Susan and Olivia sway back and forth, Susan banging back and forth against the walls of the hall, pretending the ship was rocking back and forth. “Airships don’t sway like that, Susan,” Meg rolled her eyes. “Boats do.”

 _Yes they do,_ Jennifer protested silently.

_(what was that? is that supposed to happen?)_

Susan got dizzy eventually and sat against the wall, legs stretched out. Now that wasn’t right: Many of the walkways and halls on the airship had been uncomfortably narrow, sitting down against the wall would be frowned upon because there wouldn’t be much room to get by without stepping on someone.

_(up now, dear, can’t be sitting down there-)_

For a time, it was just exploration. They pretended to take in the gloriously beautiful rooms and furniture of the first-class cabins-

_(that upholstery is beautiful)_

-and the sheer size of the ship and its rooms, bigger than most of the girls had ever seen in their lives-

_(i’ve never seen a dining room so big!)_

-and Jennifer silently tagged along and corrected them in her mind, _It’s really no bigger than our room_ and _It didn’t have **that** many windows_ and _Really, it’s just a kitchen, it wasn’t that spectacular-_

She kept it to herself. They would not appreciate it.

“Oh _dear,_ ” Diana said after a time, peering out the second-floor window. “We’re flying far too close to the ground. We might crash!” She turned and looked Jennifer in the eye. “What do you think, Jennifer?”

_(come along, jenny, let’s have some fun!)_

For the first time since she had arrived at the orphanage, Jennifer did not think that Diana was deliberately prodding at her weak-spots. Diana was an odd creature, one that vacillated between unstrained kindness and malicious cruelty on a minute-by-minute basis. It was never easy to tell if one was being needled or not.

“Um,” She had to think of something quickly, or she would be accused of ruining the game-

_(oh stop being such a grump, jenny, don’t ruin it for all of us-)_

-and that was never something one wanted to be accused of around here, especially by Diana.

“We- We should pull up-”

_(goodness, what was that?!)_

“-and away from the trees.” Jennifer squeaked, and Diana nodded approvingly.

“Sound idea. Meg, perhaps you should tell the captain-”

Diana yelped and fell to the ground, and it was clearly feigned- they’ve heard Diana shout for _real_ before- and she said, “Too late! We’re going down!”

And as usual the others followed Diana’s lead, throwing themselves to the ground and shouting in feigned panic, pretending that the ship was going down, and Jennifer couldn’t go along with this part, she can’t, because all she could think of was _(oh my god! oh my god!)_ and _(jennifer? jennifer? where are you?!_ ) and the sounds of engines roaring and wind whistling and screams screams _screams_ -

Jennifer bolted, thunderous crashing in her ears.

When she came to and the world was silent again, and she was crouching in the front yard, pressed against the front gate. Grass and dirt, solid ground, reminded her that it was over. In the past. Done with.

_(dead)_

“Jennifer!”

It was coming from inside the orphanage. Jennifer tensed for a moment, uncertain if it was friend or foe (with the overwhelming likelihood of the latter, it was always good to be cautious).

“ _Jennifer!_ ”

Her shoulders slumped with relief. Not foe, but her only friend calling out to her, looking for her, probably hearing from one of the other children that Jennifer had taken off during their game.

Wendy knew what the others didn’t know about Jennifer.

Wendy understood.

Wendy would make everything better.

 

-End


End file.
